Only 3.8 million watched Oranje vs. Qatar match; Lowest World Cup viewership this century

The FIFA World Cup match between Oranje and Qatar on Tuesday saw a low point in the regular viewing figures. Only 3.8 million people in the Netherlands tuned in to watch their national team play against the host country, the lowest figure this century, according to media agency GroupM’s analysis of StichtingKijkonderzoek figures.

Why so few people tuned in to watch the match is a difficult question to answer, media specialist Jim Leeuw of GroupM told NU.nl. “It seems to be a combination of the time [4:00 p.m. on a Tuesday] and the unattractiveness of the match. The tumult surrounding the World Cup and the fact that the Netherlands played Qatar may also play a role.” It is also the first time the World Cup is happening in November instead of June.

According to Leeuw, weekday afternoon matches were also less watched during the 2010 World Cup, though the least watched match then still attracted 4.2 million viewers at 1:30 p.m. on a Monday. More people may tune in as Oranje advances in the tournament. “The viewing figures for 2010 also indicate that,” Leeuw said to the newspaper.

Oranje’s next match is against the United States in the eighth-finals on Saturday at 4 p.m. A big viewing event in the Johan Cruijff ArenA in Amsterdam was canceled due to a lack of interest, according to Nu.nl. No members of the Dutch Cabinet will attend the match in Qatar.

The Qatar World Cup also did not lead to a rush of tourism to the Gulf State, as the country had hoped, BNR reported. Tour operators in the Netherlands see no increase in bookings for the period after the World Cup, though such increases were visible for South Africa and Brazil after the countries hosted the football tournament.

According to Stefan Hartman, affiliated with the European Tourism Futures Institute of the NHL Steden University of Applied Sciences, that is partly because Qatar does not have much to offer tourists and partly because of the country’s image. “Never before have so many people died during the construction of a World Cup stadium. We’ve seen how the world and the world’s press reacted to that. I doubt Qatar will be remembered as a country that hosted a successful World Cup or for violating human rights.”